


a lover without a lover

by havisham



Series: havisham's SASO 2017 works collection [52]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Bittersweet, First Love, Friends to Lovers, Lovers to Friends, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-22
Updated: 2017-07-22
Packaged: 2018-12-05 07:23:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11573199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/havisham/pseuds/havisham
Summary: Chris loves Victor, but that isn't enough.





	a lover without a lover

**Author's Note:**

> Written for SASO 2017, Bonus Round Four: Quotes, for [the prompt](http://sportsanime.dreamwidth.org/23665.html?thread=14354801#cmt14354801): Christophe Giacometti/Victor Nikiforov, “I am a lover without a lover. I am lovely and lonely and I belong deeply to myself.” — Warsan Shire.

Chris had never been lonely. He didn't know what that felt like. It sounded fascinating, he told Victor earnestly, which earned him a fond, but skeptical look from Victor. 

“Will you be lonely in the men’s division, Victor?” Chris said, tilting his head to the side to show his golden curls to their best advantage. “Stay in junior’s with me and we'll have fun.” 

“I always have fun with you, Chris,” Victor said, leaning down and pressing a brief kiss on Chris’ forehead. “But it's true that I'm often lonely.” 

“But why?” Chris asked, honestly puzzled. “You have Yakov, your rinkmates -- and more importantly, Makkachin! How can you be lonely?” 

Victor hugged at his knees. For a moment, with his long hair slipping past his shoulders and he looked very young, younger than Chris had ever seen him. “I think I was born lonely, sometimes. There is always a glass between myself and others. It's my fault, I think, for not breaking it like I should.” 

“You feel it even with me?” Chris asked curiously. “Aren't we friends?” 

“Yes, of course,” Victor said quickly. He shot Chris a brief but dazzling smile. “We are good friends, Chris. Let's be that way forever.” 

*

Chris thought he would die if he didn't have Victor.

Victor was his first love, which had bloomed from the first time he'd caught that rose. When he finally told Victor that he wanted to to date him, Victor had looked uncharacteristically serious and then agreed. 

There were so many reasons it couldn't work -- they lived on opposite sides of the globe, they were traveling constantly (but not with each other), they only met at competitions and even then their time was planned down to the second. 

But even then there were stolen kisses, precious moments together where a whole page of meaning could be conveyed with a shared look, a quirk of the eyebrow, a lifting of a corner of a mouth. 

“I think I really love you,” Chris confessed one day. He was visiting Saint Petersburg and they were walking to practice together, close enough so that Chris could feel the heat of Victor’s body against him. Victor made a noise, halfway between a laugh and a sigh and Chris’ heart sank. 

They broke up soon afterward. It was a no-fault breakup, officially, but Chris blamed himself. He wasn't perfect enough for Victor. He wasn't enough for Victor. 

He wished so much that he could be. Instead, he was just a lover without love.


End file.
